


Outrun the Demons

by badjujuboo (miztrezboo)



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Implied Relationships, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-13
Updated: 2012-08-21
Packaged: 2017-11-12 01:39:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/485230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miztrezboo/pseuds/badjujuboo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>you always come back to the places your trying to hide from.</em> virtually song!fic from <a href="http://youtu.be/qqkYW_vcyPw">Frank Ocean and Bad Religion</a> feels.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. outrun the demons

**Author's Note:**

> T | unrequited love, angst, feelings, mentions of religion and the bombings in London (nothing detailed) | 2.5k | zayn!centric (liam/zayn, liam/louis, zayn/harry)

_To me it's nothing but a one-man cult  
And cyanide in my styrofoam cup_

 

The smell of smoke and something spicy like cardamom and curry and his mother’s kitchen were thick in the air. He shut the door quickly and just told the man to drive. He didn’t want time to look back and see if anyone was following. Didn’t want to see that no one was.

The sounds of the city and whatever talk-back radio station was playing were loud, but not loud enough for Zayn to block out the words he was running away from.

“I can’t” and “I’m sorry” and “don’t” and love, love, love.

“Where to, mate?”

And Zayn shrugs. He can’t go back, and going anywhere he knows will only serve to remind him of them and what he thought he could . . . .

“Anywhere. I don’t care. Take the longest route ‘round the city—I’ve got money. Pretend I’m a tourist or summat.” He pinches his brow, lets his hat tip low, and presses himself back into the leather seat.

“You all right there, lad?”

And Zayn snorts. Fuck, he hasn’t been all right for a long time. Not today, not last week, not last month, not five years ago. Not since it began with a boy and a smile and and crinkly skin around eyes as warm as the friendship he offered. Friendship. A friendship that Zayn valued, but now?

Now he doesn’t even have that.

“Not really,” he ends up saying, the words sticking in his throat and he swallows and swallows but the hurt won’t clear. The pain is just building and building and its pricking at his eyes and he doesn’t want to cry. _“Big boys don’t cry, Zayn Javadd,”_ he hears his father’s voice, he hears the lightness, sees the shaking finger but the undercurrent of truth under it all. So he squeezes his eyes shut, presses his hands into fists so tight he can feel his fingernails piercing into his skin. He sits there and the driver says nothing for a while and the two voices on the radio continue speaking in a language so thick and fast he picks up only a few words because it’s Arabic and he’s never really managed more than that.

. . .

They circle slowly around Trafalgar Square; it’s that time of day when traffic oozes like the golden syrup Liam likes to pour all over his porridge. Zayn’s heart shatters just a little more with memories of breakfasts they’ll never share. Not again. Not like they ever really got to, after all.

Zayn looks out the window and spots a group of Asian students all posing for a picture, smiles wide and fingers held up, and he wants to yell at them to stop. Wants to scream that there can’t be happiness like that when he feels like everything is so, so wrong. Instead he sighs, slipping down low into the seat, and rubs the heels of his hands into his eyes, trying not to see Liam’s face behind them. He focuses on what sounds like angry words being spoken through the speakers, but there’s laughter so, obviously it isn’t. He wants to hear that and only that, not Liam and his apologies. Not Liam and his “as a friend’ and “always a friend. Always.”

“You know, in my other job I’m a bartender.”

Zayn doesn’t shift his hands but he does stop grinding them into his eye sockets because—“What?”

“Just saying that if you want to talk, I’m a good listener.”

Zayn scoffs a little. He shifts his hands back down and uses one to rub at a three-inch-long cut in the seat where the stuffing is coming out a little. He remembers another time a week ago when Liam had said something similiar because Zayn was trying _so hard_ not to let all the words he’d held in for what felt like years come tumbling out.

Then today, he did. Today, which was like any other day when he’d met Li for a late brunch after an even later night at the studio setting up for the next weekend’s exhibition. He’d had eggs benedict with mushrooms on the side, and Li had the full english while they shared a pot of Earl Grey. It was normal. It was the same waitress they had every Saturday not even giving them menus, just greeting them with a smile and putting down their tea a minute after they arrived, like she’d been waiting for them.

It was Liam smiling and saying “Thanks, love” and Zayn saying “I love you” and Liam’s eyes going so, so wide and Zayn realising he’d said it out loud.

Then food being pushed around plates because Liam knew Zayn meant it in another way than all the other times they’d said those three words to each other. It was the tea going untouched as they sat and it became awkward and then Liam paying for their bill and Zayn following him out and up to Liam’s flat, like they did every Saturday. It was Zayn feeling sick and then Liam shutting the door and breaths being so loud and his pulse even louder in his ears until Liam said, “Zayn . . .” and it came out in a way that was filled with pity and sorrow.

It was Zayn fucking everything up. Five years of friendship and a snog when they were drunk and secrets told and more secrets kept until Zayn was filled with them, until today.

Today, when he burst.

“We don’t have the time, mate,” he whispers, and he brushes away the lone tear that somehow has slid down his cheek.  
. . .

The taxi stops and Zayn waits for it to move. Waits and waits and waits, and it’s only when he looks up as a clap of thunder shakes the air that he realises the driver has actually pulled over. He looks out the window and wipes at the condensation already forming there and laughs.

“Do I look Christian?”

The driver says nothing, just turns the radio down. “You don’t have to be Christian to need a little faith.”

Zayn blinks and looks through the heavy drops of rain to the old grey building standing strong and tall, home to more memories and history than can be counted. It was _their_ history, too. Liam went through a huge history phase when they first met. He’d been new to the city, just like Zayn, and every Saturday after they’d had brunch (a tea and whatever finery McDonald’s had to offer back then) they’d wander. Liam liked architecture and he wasn’t religious, but it was Westminster Abbey, and Zayn liked the way Liam’s face lit up when he rattled off facts that were in the guidebook. Zayn never even opened his own.

“I gave up on God a long time ago,” Zayn says, surprised at the lack of bitterness in his tone that’s been there ever since he lost his grandfather and father to mindless bombings while all they did was sit in a carriage on the tube.

“You look like you need to talk—if not to me, then . . . .” The driver looks up and for the first time Zayn notices the cross hanging from the rearview mirror. It’s not big and gaudy, rather small, actually, and wooden. Old, even.

“I wouldn’t even know where to start.”

“I find the beginning is the best place.”

Zayn draws a face in the condensation on the glass, and the rain outside makes it look like it’s crying. He wipes it out.

“It doesn’t matter anyhow.”

. . .

He does speak, though.

They drive past Buckingham Palace and he starts in on a story about Liam getting all embarrassed and blushing bright, bright red when he was hushed by the tour guide for interrupting too many times with questions when they’d first visited.

Then it’s Hyde Park and the concerts they’ve been to and meeting Ed Sheeran because he was a mate of Harry’s who interned at the radio station where Liam worked. The pouring rain and laughing at Louis because he kept sliding over in his too-big wellingtons and then laughing until they cried when he jumped on Liam’s back and demanded a piggyback ride till they got to the safety of the street.

They’re winding through Notting Hill and Zayn is smiling because of all the times they’ve watched that movie because it’s Louis’ favourite and Liam can never say no to anyone, especially not Louis and his pout and puppy-eyes. He mentions the day he and Liam came up here to look for the bench made so famous by that film with Hugh Grant sitting on it and being disappointed it was in a private garden.

Then he’s quiet again as they twist and turn and everything looks too familiar.

“You can’t run away from all your problems. It sounds like this is where you need to be.”

Zayn says nothing. He just looks out and stares at the stairs he ran down nearly an hour ago. He stares and he stares because for some reason the driver has brought him back here, and here is where he can’t be—doesn’t want to be—but is, all the same.

He pays the man and gets out because sitting in the car and talking and talking hasn’t done anything. Running away the moment Liam said he didn’t return his feelings didn’t help, either. At the very least, this is close to where Zayn lives, too, and with one last look up at Liam’s building he turns and walks the two blocks over to his own studio.

His heart is heavy and his feet even more so as he wanders, lapels pulled up high and hat down low, making his way down familiar streets to his home. He opens the heavy door, giving it a great push because the damn thing sticks in the rain, and he heads up the staircase. He doesn’t notice that his door is sort of open until he’s put the key in and turns it and falls into his flat.

And he should be freaking out; crime is a bit prevelant around here lately. And he should be more hesitant about stepping over the threshold, because someone could still be inside ...

... and someone is.

 

. . .

If this were a movie it would be Liam sitting on his sofa, flipping through the photo album Zayn always keeps on the coffee table.

If this were a movie it would be Liam saying he took it all back—that what Zayn admitted to was a surprise and Liam’s thought about it and he loves Zayn, too. He loves Zayn, too.

But it’s not.

It’s just Harry and he’s in nothing but his bloody birthday suit, scratching at his belly where he’s balanced a slice of pizza on what looks to be a wad of bog roll. They probably ran out of paper towel again. It’s Harry and he just gives Zayn a quick cursory glance from where he’s taking a hit from a withered apple he’s carved a pipe into. It’s Harry who blinks slowly as he lets the sweet smoke out after holding it in, shifting the apple onto the floor with more care than he looks like he’s able to if the red rimming his eyes is anything to go by. He opens his arms and Zayn falls into them, and Harry just wraps one arm around him and pulls him in close.

“Who?” he asks quietly when they’ve sat there through two ad breaks on some weird daytime TV show that Harry pretends not to be obsessed with if Louis is over but will discuss in depth with Niall as soon as Lou leaves.

“He was worried.”

And Zayn presses himself against Harry a little more. _He_ could mean any one of their close friends, but Zayn knows exactly who _he_ is. Always caring. Always worried, even when Zayn didn’t want him to be.

“Lou rang, too, left a message but I deleted it.”

Zayn cringes, imagining what Liam’s boyfriend would have to say. Imagines it wouldn’t be any sort of concern for Zayn at all.

“Good thing is, we don’t have to go suit shopping in the morning.”

Zayn laughs. It bubbles out of his chest, unwarranted, because of _course_ Harry looks at the bright side of things. Especially if it includes the two things he hates most: clothes and shopping for them.

Harry ruffles his hair knocking Zayn’s hat to the floor, and the move just reminds him of how Liam would do the same thing. The whole part of Zayn sitting here, curled up on the sofa and pressed against someone male and warm, has him thinking of Liam and all the times they’ve done the same, and it’s too much.

Too much.

His heart slows from hurt and he gets up on shaky legs, suddenly desperate to be alone.

“‘m gonna head to bed. Need a lie-down,” he says, his voice thick with emotion that he’s bottled up for too long. He tried and failed with Liam. He’s probably lost his friend—his _best_ friend—forever, and another mate in the process, and even Zayn knows he needs to grieve over this properly. The good thing about having Harry here is he knows Harry will let him.

Harry’s been through heartache, too. It’s how they met Louis and how they met Niall at the pub he works at, when Zayn took Harry out to drink Louis out of his system and Liam did something similar with Louis, but they went out on the opposite side of town. They went out and then kept going out, and Zayn and Harry just got drunk or stoned and laughed whereas Liam and Louis moved in together and then _got_ together, and there never really was a time for Zayn after.

So he turns and he shuffles off, knowing Harry will either stay or find his own way home, pausing for only a minute as he gets to his bedroom door.

“Things would be so much easier if I fell in love with you,” he says back to where Harry is still spread out on the sofa.

He misses the way Harry stares longingly at his back. Misses the way Harry runs his long fingers through his tangle of curls and sighs, his eyes no longer impassive but sad. Zayn’s head is on his pillow, the soft quilt his grandmother made tugged around him, still fully clothed, when he misses Harry looking out the window, whispering a soft “I know.”

 

_I can never make him love me  
Never make him love me_


	2. until it turns from colour to black and white

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> he sees what he wants to see and nothing more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i blame frank ocean and lots of medication for yet ANOTHER cold for this. 
> 
> and Shrd - the zayn to my liam for mentioning a sequel and prompting conversations with emo!zayn in my head.
> 
> sorrynotsorry.
> 
> Title from lyrics by Frank Ocean, quotey things from Richard Siken who kills me.

_”this is the essence of love and failure.”_

 

They aren’t invited to the wedding. 

Well, not exactly. They _were_ invited up until Zayn chose to reveal his feelings for Liam, and then Louis found out and it all went to shit on the friendship front. 

He and Harry go anyway.

They aren’t positioned at the front. Liam has an old friend from school in his best man’s spot now, and Zayn pretends it doesn’t hurt to see Andy in his place. He knows Liam hasn’t even talked to that git in years; Andy was a bit weird with Liam coming out in high school, but somehow he reappeared in Liam’s life the moment Liam got popular on his radio gig.

Still, from where they are standing at the back of the park, sunlight dappling through the tree line and an almost heavenly ray spotlighting where the wedding party are now repeating vows that will supposedly entangle their lives into an endless forever, Zayn’s heart breaks anew. 

That could have been him up there, being the supportive friend. Being the best friend who was happy for _his_ friends’ happiness. Being the person Liam had leaned on, discussed everything with for five years before Louis came along and five years after that when Louis was all Liam could talk about. He could have tucked away his real feelings for a little longer. Could have stood there and watched Liam saying the same words he was now until every breath from Liam’s lungs sliced and shredded any feelings Zayn had for him into pieces far too small to ever stitch back together. 

He could have. Well, he had thought it was a possibility right up until it all came pouring out that morning. One stupid Saturday and one stupid brunch that ended in not having a friend at all.

“Do you want to leave?” 

Harry’s fingertips dig into the soft skin above Zayn’s elbow through his blazer. Zayn stares ahead, because Liam is taking Louis’ hands in his and his smile— _fuck_ , his smile . . . . Harry’s fingers slide down Zayn’s arm until they twine between Zayn’s and Harry squeezes. His reassurance is warm and tight and it burns bright through Zayn’s body, encircling his broken heart. Zayn blinks, the scene in front of him having become blurry, and he scrubs at his cheek with his free hand and nods because he can’t make words happen right now.

. . .

Everything is blurred. It’s like he’s underwater; there’s this pressure on his chest, and breathing isn’t as easy as it should be. Then there’s laughter coming from somewhere to his right and there’s a warm body pressed against his left side, an arm heavy across his shoulder, and Zayn leans in, turning his head to the side and nuzzling at warm, spiced skin. 

He digs his nose in a little more and the hand on his shoulder presses down and then it’s blunt nails digging into his flesh because he wore a sleeveless shirt and the pain sings its way up and down his arm. He moans a little into whoever’s neck his lips are now pressed against and his skin is sliced into again, pressure pulling him in closer.

Zayn wonders if it’s the vodka or the little blue pill Ed gave to him earlier that is making him feel like this. 

That thought is dismissed as Zayn breathes out a sigh, his lips meeting the warm skin he’s pressed against, and then it’s easy enough for his tongue to poke out and taste. It’s salty and slightly chemical—probably cologne—but Zayn doesn’t mind. He doesn’t care. He just wants to _feel_ , and this—this, as whoever he’s sort of sucking on turns and Zayn’s eyelids flutter closed seconds before chapped, dry lips meet his—this feels good.

Or maybe not good, but it’s something.

They kiss and they kiss and then the laughter and _noise_ to his right is gone and he feels himself being pushed backwards and there’s a rather large and fuzzy pillow under his neck that he falls upon. He likes how hot and heavy the person is above him. Likes how he fits between Zayn’s spread thighs, and Zayn remembers to be thankful that this house with the party Harry dragged him to has such a lovely wide sofa for him to do this on.

They don’t really do anything. Just kiss. But it’s that lazy kind of kissing where tongues explore and lips just press and touch and it’s lovely. Lovely. 

“Want this,” the boy says above him. Zayn can hear the words but he’s drowning now, can’t breathe. They’re not important. 

“Wanted you for so long.”

Zayn just kisses him all the harder. Presses his lips hard to the boy’s above him and the words shut up, shut up and _nonono_ repeat as he sinks down, down, down into a place where whatever _this_ is, is everything and nothing at all. Then his thumbs find their way into the belt loops of the man above him and Zayn sort of goes all pliant and soft as he lies there, just holding on as the man spins the wheel and steers them both. He is liquid. He is the ocean. He is rock and roll, twist and touch, and movement—movement above it all. Then he can hear Liam’s voice, “The body is around ninety percent water, you know,” and everything stops.

It stops and he’s pushing up and nearly kneeing whoever it is in the balls in his effort to be _gone_.

. . .

He doesn’t see Harry for a week after that.

It doesn’t occur to him why.

He doesn’t remember the party that well. Just sinks into the darkness of his flat and ignores the phone calls from everyone, including the owner of the gallery who he’s pretty sure won’t forgive him for not bothering to show up this time. He barely eats or sleeps and doesn’t dream.

He is filled with hate and hurt and it’s worse than last time. It’s worse than when he revealed himself to Liam. It’s worse, and Zayn doesn’t know why.

He doesn’t try to work it out, either.

. . .

“You’re a stupid fuck, you know that?”

Zayn blinks lazily. The only light in his room comes from a split in the curtains where he managed to open his window a few inches yesterday once the summer heat got to him. Even with it, the small amount of yellow sunshine, the quick flare of light reflected from something silver and shiny, neither are needed to know who this is.

“I can’t . . . I won’t let you do this to yourself. Your bloody mother rang me, Zayn. She’s worried and she said your sisters aren’t even talking to you and nobody has—” He stops and breathes out this long, shaky breath, and Zayn holds his own. “You can’t _do_ this, Zayn.”

Zayn wants to laugh. Wants to rage and ask what gives _him_ a right to care so much? What makes him think that him being here and saying these things makes up for anything?

But he can’t because it’s Liam, and Liam is here, and even with everything . . . Liam is here.

Zayn, like the glutton for punishment he is, _wants_ him now more than ever.

There are soft fingertips on his cheek. They move down slowly and slide behind his ear into his hair. He feels the quick cold press of metal from where Liam’s hand sits and he ignores it. Then there’s a dip in the bed beside him and Zayn holds his breath.

“I saw you. Well, I saw your backs when you left. I know why you didn’t stay, but I’m glad you came.” Liam talks quietly, his fingers still stroking Zayn’s skin and his hair. Zayn’s heart is cracking all over again and he wonders if Liam can hear it, it feels so loud.

“I miss you, and I understand it’s going to take a while. Louis isn’t happy that I’m here, but he was the one who told me to come, and—” Zayn stills, even more so than before because that one name is everything he wants to avoid and the way Liam says it, so filled with the love he feels, is just too much. “You can’t do this, Zayn. You have to sort yourself out, mate. If not for you and not for me—because it shouldn’t be for me, I’ve hurt you enough—I just . . . . You can’t _do_ this.”

They stay that way for a while. Zayn marks the time by Liam’s slow, even breaths and by the way his skin burns under Liam’s touch.

The next time he wakes Liam is gone and Zayn breathes out, wondering if he’s been holding it all along.

. . .

It’s not because of Liam that he gets out of bed. 

It’s not.

It _is_ because of Liam that he starts painting again. All reds and blacks and greys at the start and then it’s oranges and lemons and his art takes on citrus hues, so he packs his meagre things and takes Niall up on staying at his mate’s villa in the south of Spain. 

It’s warm and he feels the sun sink into his skin, warming his bones, and then it’s in his arteries and his lungs and that space in his chest starts to thaw. 

. . .

It’s raining in London when he arrives. It’s pouring, really, and all Zayn can do is laugh, a sound that comes free and easy after six months in Malaga. He flags down a cab at the airport and throws his duffle bag on the seat, sliding in behind it after a few seconds. He has time enough to push his hair up and out of his face—it sticks and he thinks about shaking it out, but then that would be rude, wouldn’t it? Wetting the interior of a car that’s not his—as the driver speaks.

“Where to, mate?”

The address in Soho rolls off his tongue and the driver takes off with a flurry of horns behind him before Zayn has time to settle himself on the seat. 

He pulls out his phone and taps at the screen, flicking through to the photo he’s come back to more and more often recently, so much so he can actually bring it up while lying in the dark and not looking at the screen. He bites at his lip because even now, weeks after making this decision, he’s still not entirely sure of it. He opens his mouth to give another address, get the driver to take him someplace else, but closes it and chews on his lip some more. Instead, he leans his head back into the seat and holds the phone up close to his chest.

“You all right there?” 

Zayn sighs and raises his brows with a noncommittal noise. “Sort of?” he answers, and the driver laughs. The noise is loud and covers the rhythmic Arabic music pumping out of the speakers. 

“Want me to go the long way again? Still a bartender, still got an ear for you to bend.” 

Zayn looks up then, catches the wooden cross hanging from the rear-view mirror. He breathes in, smells spices and cardamom and remembers that he has to call his mother. He breathes out. And there’s laughter on the radio followed by two of the words he knows well enough to recognise in a language he probably should know more of. 

The man laughs again and Zayn smiles, something that comes free and easy these days.

“Got a good mind for a face, I do. Helps in a job like this on occasion.” Zayn snorts and shakes his head. “Long way again? Or . . . .” 

“Nah, mate. I’ve been taking the long way for too long. Quick as you can, please.”

The man laughs again, a real proper belly laugh, and Zayn joins in. He feels like he’s brought the sun of months away with him, and the rain suddenly doesn’t seem so bad any more.

. . . 

He doesn’t talk this time. 

Doesn’t say a word as familiar landmarks come into view. Actually smiles as they drive past Liam and Louis’ flat, and his fingers are drumming out a fierce rhythm on his knee when they finally stop.

“Got everything sorted now?” the man asks when he stops the cab. Zayn drags his eyes away from the window and what lies ahead of him. 

He nods. “Sort of. Maybe. I think?” 

Laughter fills the cab again as Zayn pays the man and gets out. He waves the cab off as it leaves the curb with a jaunty few honks of the horn, and Zayn steadies his bag on his shoulder. 

The smile he’s worn since he figured things out, since he _woke up_ , really, flickers at the corner of his lips. With a soft “Fuck it,” he shifts the bag once more and heads into the building.

. . .

“I’m sorry.”

Harry blinks and stares from his position on Zayn’s sofa. It’s weird how seeing that same cabbie and walking up the same stairs after pushing hard on the same door that sticks because of the rain makes Zayn feel like he’s travelled back in time. 

Harry puts down the pipe (not an apple this time, but something glass and pretty that Zayn bought him for his birthday a few years ago). Harry blows out this long line of smoke, and when he scratches at his bare belly Zayn almost laughs because it’s just so . . . so _Harry_.

Harry is still staring and Zayn isn’t really smiling any more because his veins are vibrating with how fast his heart is pumping blood around and around. He drops his bag, because it’s still his flat even if Harry has been living here since getting sort of kicked out of his own and Niall gave him the keys after giving Zayn a quick call to check if it was all right. He steps over to Harry, around several empty lager cans and a few bits of clothing that Zayn thinks might be his own but he’s not sure. He and Harry have always shared clothing; it wasn’t anything to him then, but seeing his things on the floor, obviously worn, does this funny jump-start to Zayn’s stomach.

“I never—I never said it that night and I never said it after, and I know what it feels like.” A shadow crosses Harry’s face at Zayn’s words. His head tilts down so the brown curls that Zayn hasn’t stopped painting for _months_ cover his face. Cover the eyes that Zayn’s not been able to stop seeing when he closes his eyes to go to sleep.

“You never even told me you were leaving.” 

Zayn swallows at the rough sound of Harry’s voice, the telling hurt in his tone. 

“I’m glad you’re home.” Harry smiles and Zayn can see it from under his long, unkempt curls and it’s enough. It’s enough for now when Harry reaches one hand up, his arm extended in Zayn’s direction, and it’s enough to have Zayn linking their fingers as he moves to sit down beside him.

It’s enough for now.

 

_”you see what i mean and you’re happy anyway, and that’s okay,_

  
_it’s a love story after all.”_   



	3. you’re the dealer and the stoner (with the sweetest kiss i’ve ever known)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> love is so short. forgetting is so long - neruda

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> idek - i have no excuse for this but i askd shrdmdnssftw if it was a good idea and she said yes so.. i apologise. big love to i_am_ammo for tweakage xx
> 
> its still frank ocean's fault. especially the title and the first quote. the second (and summary) are pablo neruda.

**you’re the dealer and the stoner (with the sweetest kiss i’ve ever known)**

_we once had things in common, now the only thing we share is the refrigerator_

 

Zayn staggers out the door, wiping at his mouth with one hand and blinking at the harsh lights outside the pub. All he can hear is his name being called and apologies rolling off a tongue thickened with alcohol. He swallows hard and gets in the first cab that pulls up, sending up a little prayer to whoever is listening that he doesn’t throw up inside. 

“You make a mess in here, lad, you’ll be paying for it.”

Zayn shakes his head, gives his address, and closes his eyes only to open them again when he can’t escape what just happened, running on an endless loop of shame behind them. He stares out the window instead, lets the cabbies choice in, something that sounds like early hits from the fifties, and zones out. 

He tries not to hear the accusations that turned his stomach first. That put the chill in his spine that he didn’t want to acknowledge because, no . . . no. He tries and fails to block the look on his friend’s face, block the way it _still_ made his insides clench when he gazed at him with those deep brown eyes that showed so much emotion. He can’t stop seeing the greasy marks on his mate’s shirt from wiping his hands down his front instead of using a napkin like he normally would—another sign Zayn should have picked up on, when he walked in, that all was not well.

He definitely tries to stop the faint buzz on his skin where his lips touched another’s. Someone who wasn’t his. Someone who wasn’t the one person he’s spent kissing for the better part of ten months now. 

He bites down hard, tastes the metallic tang of blood on his tongue, and thinks the pain will be worth it if it lets him forget what he’s done—what was done to him—for just a little while.

. . .

He doesn’t see anyone for the next week. 

It’s not as if he’s hiding out or avoiding them (maybe avoiding a little). He’s busy. Busy with setting up at the gallery for his own show. Busy in meeting after meeting because there’s interest from a few other places that want to show his work and the local art guild thing want him to work on a mural for the library or summat. Zayn’s never painted for _anyone_ apart from himself, so their efforts to woo him into it involve lunches and brunches, dinners and drinks, and he barely has a second to breathe, Caroline has him on such a tight leash. 

Harry isn’t asleep in their bed when he gets home most nights—or mornings. 

Which is nothing, really. Not irregular. He works with Liam at the station and he doesn’t have a show of his own, just fills in when people are sick or on holidays, faffs about the office getting teas and things. It’s not weird, really, that they’ve gone so long without seeing each other for at least a quick kiss in the kitchen or the bathroom while one comes in and the other heads out.

 _“Haven’t you noticed how he’s—he’s never at home when you are? How—how—”_ And no. He won’t listen. He’ll stop that train of thought right there, because what happened in the pub a week ago isn’t worth him thinking about. 

He hasn’t got time for theories. Hasn’t got time to deconstruct what happened at that pub. Hasn’t got time to rub his skin raw in the shower again until their mediocre level of hot water runs out. Hasn’t got time to keep ignoring Liam’s calls and texts and emails. 

Studio. Painting. Gallery. Dinner at eight. 

He hasn’t got time.

. . .

“You need to get your shit together, babe.” He can imagine Caroline’s pointed stare from behind the large black oversized glasses she loves to wear. It’s summer and she’s got the smallest yellow skirt on that rides up, showing more of her long, tan legs as she crosses them. Her blouse is a pretty shade of green—chartreuse or maybe jade—with tiny white flowers dotted over it. The green makes him miss the eyes he hasn’t seen in days, and then the guilt sets in and the worry on top of that and then guilt again because—he shouldn’t be worried.

Caroline snaps her fingers in front of his face, her crimson nails nearly the colour of recently spilt blood, and Zayn blinks, straightens, and attempts to focus. “Whatever this—” she waves her hand in front of his face— “is, needs to stop. Talk to your boyfriend, fuck him or let him fuck you—I don’t want to know—but I can’t carry you like I did this morning and most of last night. So think of me as your fuck fairy godmother. I’m giving you the next twenty -our hours to sort yourself, then you’re mine.”

He sits there in a bit of a daze, his fingertips still idly tracing the raised pattern on the tablecloth, and he only stops when she throws her napkin at his face. 

“Go find that curly-haired wanker of yours and scream my name the first time he lets you white out his face, all right?”

Zayn rolls his eyes, because that’s as much of a blessing on his relationship with Harry as he’s ever going to get and a dismissal all rolled into one. 

She looks up from her phone as he picks up his own from the table and quirks one manicured brow up high. “Fuck off already,” she says with a tiny flicker of amusement on her lips.

Zayn shakes his head and walks off. He doesn’t worry about the bill, because he did that once and Caroline gave him the longest bollocking of his life on gender equity and feministic rights or something. He’s never tried again. 

. . .

Harry’s curls are the only recognisable part of his body that show in their bed. He’s a burrower. For someone who hates clothes, he absolutely loves to be snuggled in sleep—the sheet pulled high up around his ears, almost, and feet entangled at the bottom so that little to no skin shows. Zayn smiles, the first proper smile he feels like he’s managed in _days_ , and shrugs off his shirt and jeans, sliding into the bed and fitting his body against Harry’s curved form with ease.

He can do this. He can lie here with Harry and just enjoy the man he’s had a relationship with even though they’ve never labelled what they are together. 

He wraps his arm around Harry’s waist, slides his hand up as close to its usual position it can get, and startles a little when Harry’s fingers thread between his own and pull their combined hands up above Harry’s heart. 

They don’t speak. They just lie there and soon Zayn’s breathing and heart match the tempo of Harry’s and he’s nearly asleep from how _right_ it feels. He hadn’t realised that he’d missed this, missed _them_ , until now, because he hasn’t let himself think on it. Hasn’t let himself dwell on the possibility that this might not be all he has started to pin on it.

That it could all be a lie.

 _“Ask him, you ask him. I know it’s true. I can feel it and I can see it and Louis won’t—he didn’t_ deny _. . . .”_

Zayn stiffens at the memory of words spoken while Liam attempted to drink his body weight in lager and vodka shots he’d convinced Niall to bring him until he was too drunk to notice Niall had switched him to water shots and shandies that were more lemonade than beer. Liam and his face lined with tears, his eyes spider-webbed with red and broken, so broken. Liam with whom Zayn had finally struck up a friendship again, as uneasy as it was. Liam who had touched him more in that one night than he had in months. Liam who hugged him and whispered that he loved him, loved him so much, and missed him even more. Liam who had caught his lips on Zayn’s and for one _tiny_ moment Zayn had let himself feel everything about what that was. 

“You’re home.” Harry’s sleep-thickened tone brought Zayn back to the now, to the boy he was wrapped around and who had a hold on more than his hand, even if he didn’t know it.

“You, too,” he whispered into Harry’s curls. 

Harry the boy he’d been lying to.

Harry who might have been lying to him, too. 

. . .

When he wakes again Harry’s still there and he smells so good and Zayn’s body reacts the way it does ninety percent of the time it does when he’s lying with Harry.

Harry notices (he always does) and starts grinding back against him while Zayn’s lips survey the line of Harry’s neck. He’s warm under Zayn’s mouth, groans a little when Zayn gets to the round of Harry’s shoulder and bites. Harry’s hand leaves Zayn’s, appearing out of the navy sheets and finding Zayn’s face, fingertips sliding into his hair and pulling Zayn in as Harry turns enough to fit their mouths together. 

It’s easy. It’s simple to do this. To kiss Harry, to lick the taste of sleep from his mouth and let his hips rock up against the perfect swell of Harry’s arse. It’s easy to slide one arm under Harry and pull him back against Zayn’s chest while Harry manages to find the little tube of lube they always have hidden under one of their pillows. It’s easy to steady Harry as he stops kissing Zayn and just breathes into him as he fits one, then two fingers inside himself, prepping for when Zayn takes over. Then it’s all about the familiar push and pull, of heat and tight and no words because they’re feeling too much to string anything together. 

It’s easy and simple, and it’s fucking unreal when he comes inside Harry with nothing between them, because of everything they never discussed, getting tested and being this trusting with each other was one of them. 

When they’re lying there and Zayn can finally _see_ again, he realises that Harry is quiet. Not that they spoke during—not even while coming—because that was just groans and held breaths and Zayn leaving quite the bruise on Harry’s neck. But after—after was always when they talked or laughed or something, and to have nothing from Harry is strange.

It’s even worse when Harry just gets up out of bed and walks to their bathroom.

Zayn’s skin chills when he hears the water start. He holds his breath when he there’s a distinct locking of the door.

He didn’t even know it _had_ a lock. 

. . .

Two days later he wakes alone, as he has done apart from that one afternoon with Harry, and there’s a note on the fridge scrawled in bright pink Sharpie: “I’m sorry.”

Zayn doesn’t crumple this time. 

He doesn’t cry or rage or anything.

He just ignores it and puts the kettle on and makes a cup of Earl Grey.

. . .

Liam is at the unveiling for the library’s mural. 

Then Harry appears and Zayn laughs because this is ridiculous.

Louis clings to Harry's side and smiles that smile of a person in love, and Zayn bristles even as he tries not to. Caroline catches his eye and frowns and makes a motion for him to circulate. He ignores her and reaches for another glass of the red they have here, which isn’t half bad. He’s probably had more than enough, but he hasn’t seen Liam since that night and Louis in even longer. 

Harry? Well, Harry just disappeared so there are a million types of feelings going on inside Zayn and he doesn’t give a shit about council or the member for whatever or Caroline or _anyone_ , because he’s not dealing with _this_. This whatever it might become.

He finishes off the glass and ducks behind some sculpture, and then he’s waving down one of the waitstaff and asking about the nearest out. They point him to a side exit and Zayn leaves. He reaches down into his pocket to turn his phone off just as it starts to buzz; without even looking he knows it’ll be Caroline. She has eyes like a hawk when it comes to his movements and a radar-like sense of when he’s leaving before he’s supposed to. 

Zayn doesn’t care, he just wants out. Wants away from things unsaid and arguments steeped in silence. 

He actually mutters a “Well, fuck” when he walks into the little bar down the street and recognises the bartender. He sits down on one of the many stools on offer.

He’s greeted with a smile and a belly laugh and “Here’s that boy I was telling you about, Reg!” 

Zayn sips at the whiskey he’s got because it’s not something he usually drinks but the cabbie-cum-bartender set it in front of him before he could even start thinking about what to order. He sips and he draws in the condensation ring his drink has left on the wooden table top and waits while other patrons are served. 

He’s a coward. He knows this. He could have had it out with Harry a million different times. Could have found out if whether Liam’s assumptions were correct. If Liam’s husband was cheating on Liam with Zayn’s Harry. If the odd schedule Harry was keeping was actually in tune with Louis. If they’d taken to fucking each other behind his back. If Harry had changed his mind and wanted Louis more than Zayn. If Louis meant more.

But that was what had broken up Harry and Lou in the first place, Louis’ wandering eye, and Zayn _knew_ that. He’d been there helping Harry glue back the pieces of his heart and solder together what was left of three years of a solid relationship gone sour. He’d done that with Harry, been there for Harry, so he couldn’t even begin to imagine Haz going back there, being part of someone who would do _that_ to someone else.

Then there were all the times he could have admitted what he and Liam had done. That he’d had one kiss. One little kiss he hadn’t even really wanted. When he got in that night Harry was up watching some shit on TV, high as a kite and giggling over nothing, but Harry would have listened. Harry probably would have been a little hurt, but Zayn would have told him the truth.

It didn’t matter.

Not when he had Harry, and what they had was way more important to Zayn than Liam being hurt and wanting to _hurt_ Louis without Louis actually knowing. 

Harry had left, though. Harry had left and Zayn hadn’t gone after him and he hadn’t solved anything with Liam, and now they were here and it felt like all the walls he;d thought were stable were completely crumbling around him.

“So you finally here to talk, then?” the man asks, polishing a clean-looking glass with an even cleaner-looking towel.

Zayn shrugs, because he probably should and he feels like he could, but . . . there’s this lump in his throat and it hurts when he swallows.

“Whatever it is, mate, I hope you’ve made some sort of decision, because there’s a lad who’s just walked in the door and he’s got his eyes set on you.”

Zayn stiffens and feels the hairs on his neck prickle. 

The man gives him a warm smile and leans in. “Stick with the truth, son. Nobody likes to be lied to.” Then he’s gone, walking to the other end of the bar.

“I’m not sorry I left.” 

Zayn doesn’t look up. Doesn’t need to. He couldn’t anyway, even if he wanted to.

“Louis told me. He told me everything, and you didn’t _say_ anything, and I was so angry. So angry with you.” Zayn can picture him shaking his head, brown curls flying this way and that, and there’s so much pain and hurt in his tone that Zayn feels even worse.

“I didn’t know how,” Zayn starts, because like the bartender/cabbie said, the truth is better than anything, and really, this is all Zayn has. “It wasn’t even a proper kiss, and I know Liam regretted it the minute it happened. I didn’t believe you’d done anything with Louis, but he thought Louis was fucking around on him and he needed a friend. I should have told you.”

Harry sits down on the stool beside Zayn and sighs, taking the tumbler from in front of Zayn and drinking it down in one swallow before setting it back on the bar. Harry drinks anything as long as it has a high alcohol content. When he gets wasted it’s something quick and fast. Unlike when he tokes up, when he likes to build up on a good high layer by layer.

“You should have.”

Zayn nods, because even though they’ve both apologised, the last time Harry did he left. And this time it feels more like a goodbye than the last.

“I don’t know what Louis was doing. I think he was trying to make Liam jealous tonight, hurt you a little. They took a break.”

Zayn nods, because seeing Harry and Lou together made Zayn’s stomach twist in knots, and he hates to even imagine how it left Liam. He _doesn’t_ want to. 

It’s not important. None of that is important because Harry is here, and yes, they have more to sort out, and yes, there are more apologies and probably more arguments to be had, but . . . it’s _Harry_ and he’s here.

“Come home,” Zayn says, finally turning to take in Harry’s face, the sad green eyes he paints more than anything and the ruby lips he misses on his skin. 

Harry smiles. It’s not a proper smile, only one dimple showing, but it’s something. Harry reaches over and takes Zayn’s hand in his. His fingers fit perfectly in the spaces between Zayn’s own and he nods.

“Home.”

 

_”love is so short. Forgetting is so long”_


End file.
